The Apprenticeship System in the Caribbean: The World of the Apprentices

Unfree labor did not come to an end in the Anglophone Caribbean in 1834. Although the enslaved were declared legally free on August 1, they were obliged to serve a period of Apprenticeship to their former masters. This meant that ex-slaves were legally obligated to work without compensation for their former masters for up to forty-five hours per week. Their term of continued compulsory labor depended on their status: former field slaves (praedials) were to be apprenticed for six years while skilled apprentices and domestics (non-praedials) were to be fully free after four years. Apprentices resisted the system at its outset; subsequently, they attempted to assert their rights as much as possible during the Apprenticeship period, even in the face of a highly oppressive system. This paper seeks to recreate aspects of their world and understand how apprentices sought to use Apprenticeship to improve their lives.